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An Osterman Research Executive Brief
Published March 2012
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Third-Party Archiving: Still Needed in Exchange 2010
EXCHANGE 2010 INCLUDES BUILT-IN ARCHIVING – AND IMPROVES SOME
ARCHIVING-LIKE FEATURES
Unlike previous versions of Exchange, Microsoft has for the first time built archiving into
Exchange 2010. Osterman Research forecasts that migration to Exchange 2010 will continue to increase at a brisk pace, making Exchange 2010 one of the company’s more successful server offerings. Given that archiving is now a standard feature of Exchange 2010, this will raise awareness of the importance and utility of archiving as a best practice given Microsoft’s leading position in the email industry.
There are two additional improvements in Exchange 2010 that offer a small subset of the benefit of having an email archiving system, although it is important to note that these features are not true archiving capabilities:
• The “dumpster” in Exchange 2010 – which offers an archiving-like capability of being able to retrieve missing or deleted emails – offers significant improvements over older versions. For example, users can employ the dumpster to restore individual emails that were mistakenly deleted: when an email message is deleted it is transferred to the Deleted Items folder where it remains until the folder is emptied. After that, the deleted email moves into the dumpster where it is retained for the length of time established by the administrator (30 days by default). This permits users to recover their email for a month following its deletion, or for whatever length of time the admin has established.
• In Exchange 2010, Database Availability Groups (DAGs) are also new, replacing the Local Cluster Continuous Replication (CCR), Continuous Replication (LCR), Single Copy Clusters (SCC) and Standby Continuous Replication (SCR) functions that were included in Exchange 2007. In Exchange 2010, the SCC and LCR functions were eliminated, but the SCR and CCR functions have been melded into the new DAG functionality. Here, too, DAGs provide some of the benefit of having an email archiving system in that they provide some level of
disaster recovery.
HOWEVER, THIRD PARTY ARCHIVING IS STILL NECESSARY
The inclusion of archiving in Exchange 2010 is an important step forward for a couple of reasons. First, it enables organizations to implement basic archiving capabilities natively. Second, and more strategically, it raises the profile of archiving’s importance as a best practice for purposes of e-discovery, regulatory compliance, preservation of corporate memory and the like.
That said, and while Microsoft is to be commended for recognizing the critical need for natively archiving business records and other important content in email, Osterman Research believes that most organizations that deploy Exchange 2010 should seriously consider the use of third-party archiving solutions for a variety of reasons:
• Single instance storage is no longer available
significant problem that storage management represents in managing email systems (numerous Osterman Research surveys have found that storage-related issues represent at least five of the top ten problems in managing email systems). The lower storage costs in Exchange 2010 that are possible because of the use of less expensive storage will, in many cases, be at least partially offset by elimination of SIS.
• Exchange server load is not reduced
Exchange 2010’s native archiving functionality does not reduce the load on Exchange servers as is the case with many third-party archiving solutions. On-server archiving in Exchange 2010 does not take advantage of slower, less expensive media, and so an
important advantage of third-party archiving solutions is not available natively in Exchange. • Large mailboxes can create problems
The larger mailboxes in Exchange 2010 compared to previous versions offer advantages from a usability and quota management perspective, but they impose additional strain on network bandwidth, more difficult disaster recovery and longer backup/restore windows. • E-discovery capabilities are not as sophisticated as many will need
The discovery capabilities built into Exchange 2010 are useful for performing some e-discovery capabilities. However, they will not satisfy some of the more sophisticated requirements that many organizations will require. This will necessitate the use of a third-party solution for more involved functions when organizations must satisfy e-discovery obligations and related requirements, such as responding to complex regulatory audits. • Exchange 2010 archiving requires the use of Outlook 2010
In order to use the archiving capabilities in Exchange 2010; Outlook 2010 and a
corresponding enterprise Client Access License (CAL) are required. While many users will migrate to Outlook 2010 over the next few years anyway, negating this disadvantage in the long term, migrations of end-user infrastructure require significant levels of IT effort and time, and so happen more slowly than server upgrades in many organizations.
• Archives in Exchange 2010 are not centralized
The archives in Exchange 2010 are not centralized and are stored alongside mailbox servers on the same platform. While this is not necessarily an inherent flaw of the Exchange 2010 design model, this can be a problem for those organizations that want to centralize their archives and separate them from mailbox servers.
• Other potential problems
There is no offline access to the email archive in Exchange 2010. Moreover, management of the archive can be more cumbersome than when some third-party archiving solutions are employed.
Summary
archiving functionality in Exchange 2010, Osterman Research recommends that all Exchange 2010-enabled organizations, as well as those considering a migration, evaluate third-party archiving solutions. These solutions will typically offer capabilities that are not available in Exchange 2010 and, while they will require some investment, can actually reduce the total cost of ownership for Exchange 2010.
About Jatheon
The Jatheon PnC2 line of SMB and Enterprise email archiving solutions is a family of
vendor-neutral email archiving appliances that automatically capture a copy of every message that passes through the mail-server. It also provides users with a powerful easy-to-use search capability to help them instantly find archived messages, even those that are many years old.
The Jatheon PnC2 line of email archiving solutions start with the PnC 100, which has 700GB of
on board virtual storage (ideal for small business with less than 50 users). The family of appliances scale up to the PnC 12000, which has 50TB of on board virtual storage, suitable for any mid to large enterprise.
The primary way messages are captured is through journaling, which is the process by which email is forwarded from the mail server to the Jatheon archiving appliance. At the same time messages are captured by the appliance they are also indexed, including the header
information, message body content, and any attachments.
The search functionality provides users with the ability to search for messages. Searching the archive can be as simple or as detailed as the user would like. A simple search may include an email address, a name or a word. A more detailed search could contain date ranges, phrases, bcc field, stock symbols, conversations between two parties and many other commonly used search criteria.
• Forward messages: Users can forward the message in its original form or as a link. • Export messages: Messages can be exported to IMAP or to PDF.
• And many others useful options
OFFSITE REPOSITORY OPTION
When the mail-server’s journaling capability is used to send copies of messages automatically to the Jatheon PnC2 system, simply adding a second archiving location (off-site) to the journal
configuration will result in messages concurrently captured in two locations. In the event of a major stoppage of service, the customer can be assured of immediate access to a duplicate, up-to-date repository in the offsite facility. This Fault Tolerant Cluster (FTC) configuration is a unique Jatheon offering.
OTHER CAPABILITIES
The Jatheon PnC2 system offers SMB and Enterprise customers a combination of
compliance-related archiving features: • Automatic capture
By capturing all messages automatically there is no way possible for users to bypass the archiving system or to prevent a message from being archived by deleting it immediately after it has been sent. With the Jatheon PnC2 system, archiving of messages is not left up
to the policy awareness and interpretations of individual users. • Search message header, content or attachments
Users, managers or compliance officers can search for messages using header information, content of message body, as well as attachment file names, types and content.
• Users cannot modify or delete messages
Jatheon users can view, export, return to inbox or forward archived messages, but they cannot modify or delete messages.
• Preservation of original message
The content and format of captured messages is fully preserved in its original format. A complex algorithm can be run on any searched message to verify its integrity and prove the message hasn’t been tampered with.
• Comprehensive Reporting and Full Audit Trail
System logs report on a wide variety of user and system activities. All system activities are recorded in audit trail.
• Legal Hold
The preservation of all relevant email can be captured under legal hold when litigation is reasonably anticipated.
• Remote System Monitoring
For More Information
Jatheon Technologies, Inc. British Colonial Building8 Wellington Street East, Mezzanine Level Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5E 1C5 +1 888 528 4366 or +1 416 840 0418 [email protected]
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